This fine teen
sci-fi movie was released in
1986. It was directed by
Marshall Brickman. It was written by
Thomas Baum and
Marshall Brickman. The cast includes
John Lithgow,
Christopher Collet,
Cynthia Nixon,
Paul Austin, and many others.
Young genius Paul Stephens (Christopher Collet) meets Dr. John Mathewson (John Lithgow). Paul is a high school student in Ithica and Dr. Mathewson is a professor at the university in working in nuclear research. Paul wants to do something amazing for his science fair project. He breaks into the nearby government nuclear weapons research facility and steals some plutonium and builds a 50 mega-ton bomb. Complete with timer and everything. And surprisingly enough the government isn't too pleased about this and label him a terrorist. (The gall!) Anyway eventually it is up to Paul and Dr. Mathewson to disarm the bomb and save everybody.
I liked this movie as a kid. Looking back it seems kind of cheesy now. If you suspend your imagination it is a fairly ok movie. Not quite War Games, but very much the same style of movie (boy genius does something the government doesn't like, government chases boy genius, boy genius redeems himself by saving the day) When you are a nerdy kid growing up it is fun to daydream about doing something like this no matter how implausible it is.
Oh and the thing I remember most about this movie was Dr. Mathewson and Paul going on and on about mutated clovers that had more than 4 leaves. Oh and something about Windex, but I don't remember exactly what Paul did with it.